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Royal Canadian Mounted Police commissioner BobPaulson said at a news conference that Zehaf-Bibeau and Vickers exchanged gunfire, and the suspect was shot as he moved from behind a pillar to get a better shot at the sergeant-at-arms.

The RCMP has identified persuasive evidence that Michael Zehaf-Bibeaus attack was driven by ideological and political motives, RCMP Comm. BobPaulson said in his second update on the Ottawa terrorist attack.

"He is an interesting individual in the sense he had a very developed criminality ... a non-national-security related criminality of violence and of drugs and of mental instability," Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) Commissioner BobPaulson told a news conference on Thursday.

Zehaf-Bibeau, 32, was a Canadian who may also have held Libyan citizenship, said BobPaulson, commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP). He said the suspect had no apparent links to another Canadian who killed a soldier in Quebec earlier in the week.

Bibeau had checked into the Ottawa Mission shelter, which is less than a mile from what were to become the targets for his attacks, on October 2 after arriving from British Columbia. His passport application was "in the process of being evaluated", said BobPaulson, the national police commissioner.

These are difficult threats to detect, BobPaulson, commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), the agency investigating the shooting, said during a briefing Thursday. There is no way of knowing where or when such an attack could take place.

Michael Zehaf-Bibeau (32), was a Canadian who may also have held Libyan citizenship, said BobPaulson, commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP). He said the suspect had no apparent links to another Canadian who killed a soldier in Quebec earlier in the week.

"The prime minister and cabinet were briefed by the national security adviser [Stephen Rigby], the commissioner of the RCMP [BobPaulson], and the director of CSIS [Michel Coulombe] on the shooting yesterday and the security situation in Canada," Jason MacDonald wrote.

BobPaulson, commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, told a Parliament public safety committee on Wednesday the pace and tempo of police operations is brisk but says it's nothing that "Canadians need to be alarmed about."

Veteran officer BobPaulson takes on his new job amid a controversy that was rekindled last week when a high-profile female British Columbia Mountie said she spent years being treated as a potential sexual plaything by some supervisors.